Alarming as the present moment feels—a perfect storm of economic and public-health disasters exacerbated by political chaos and social unrest—Douglas L. Peterson ’80 P’14 P’15 encourages young people to not avert their eyes but to keep them wide open.
“Adversity and uncertainty in crisis creates opportunities to step up,” said Peterson, a member of the CMC Board of Trustees, who also serves on the advisory board of the Kravis Leadership Institute. “In 2020, all of us have opportunities to learn more than ever. If you’re young and at the beginning of your career, this is a time that you’re never going to forget. Make sure you learn all you can.”
Peterson, who is president and CEO of S&P Global, recently spoke with Jim Wilkinson, chairman and CEO of TrailRunner International. Their conversation was recorded for a special edition podcast hosted by TrailRunner.
The 28-minute colloquy began with Peterson’s sanguine assessment of the Fortune 500’s response to COVID-19.
“One of the most interesting things about this crisis is the way the corporate world has come together very quickly,” said Peterson. “There's more cooperation than I've ever seen before. The Business Roundtable almost immediately put in place a COVID task force.” CEOs, he said, are sharing ideas on everything from safety in the workplace to advocacy efforts with Congress on a stimulus program “to keep the economy going.”
The Business Council, a corporate leadership group chaired by CMC alum Henry R. Kravis ’67, likewise kicked into high gear during the pandemic. “We’re meeting much more frequently than normal,” Peterson said. “We're sharing best practices and access to some of the top global experts on epidemiology, vaccines and healthcare.”
Peterson has led S&P Global (formerly McGraw Hill Financial) since 2013, having joined the company in 2011 as president of Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services. Previously, he was chief operating officer at Citibank N.A., the culmination of a 26-year career with the bank. After earning undergraduate degrees in math and history at CMC, Peterson completed an MBA at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in 1985.
Wilkinson, who was chief of staff to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson during the 2008 financial crisis, asked Peterson to compare the economic fallout from the current pandemic to the subprime mortgage meltdown and to reflect on lessons learned.
While the crises are vastly different, Peterson observed, one takeaway the financial community applied from 2008 was the critical importance of “moving fast”—a factor, he said, that explains “what I would call a good performance from the central banks, the Fed, the Treasury, and Congress.”
Corporate Road to Racial Justice
Turning to corporate responses after the killing of George Floyd, Peterson spoke of the importance of “recognition that the things we've been doing haven’t worked.” S&P Global already had in place a Diversity and Inclusion Council and Employee Resource Groups when the Floyd video sparked national outrage.
“It wasn't enough,” Peterson declared.
To make strides in eliminating racial inequities, S&P Global Foundation has since ramped up support for civil rights organizations such as the NAACP and the ACLU. Internally, the company has introduced a fleet of new coaching, career pathing, and mentoring initiatives to promote minority leadership development among its 23,000 employees. He described a new speaker series called “Courageous Conversations” in partnership with various Black organizations. At these employee gatherings, Peterson said, “I've been hearing painful, hurtful personal stories. Stories about discrimination, about aggression, about hate. People have been pouring their souls out. It's been very emotional.”
Peterson is optimistic that real improvements are coming as major corporations huddle to combat racism.
“We can learn from each other,” he said. “I have seen a new commitment that I've never seen before. CEOs have been spending a lot of time together.”
The Business Roundtable, he noted, rapidly formed new task forces to think about racial inequity: one on criminal justice reform; another on healthcare access for African Americans; a third on education and the workforce, and a fourth on financial services for minority communities.
Advice to Future Leaders
Painful and demoralizing as the present convergence of a global pandemic and a national reckoning with racial injustice now feels, Peterson said, “this is a very special, a very interesting year. Someday, people will ask: ‘Where were you in 2020? What did you learn and what did you do?”
He counsels college students to “step up” to that challenge.
“When there's a crisis, when there's change going on, when there’s a tough job, volunteer for it. Grab it. Take it. Seek it out,” he said. “Find those tough jobs, because you're going to learn the most, and you're going to have to deal with some of the toughest circumstances.”
In other advice, he called on young leaders to “make time for others, speak with your colleagues, with your family and friends. And don't just speak, listen and learn how to build empathy.”
Lastly, he advised, in a tough employment market, “don't fixate on titles, focus on skills. Build a portfolio of skills that can send you in a direction. Sometimes a career is going to be a zigzag.”
Peterson enumerated what he considers the four essential qualities of leadership: vision, integrity, accountability, and communication.
Crisis, however, puts the spotlight on a fifth characteristic of strong leadership: decisiveness. In crisis management, he noted, leaders frequently must make decisions based on incomplete information. “It requires the flexibility to make a call, then have a second pass at it, and the ability to say, ‘I made a mistake.’ … You have to know that sometimes you're going to fail, and you can't be afraid to fail.”
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